


Telling Honest Lies

by petaldancing



Category: Ano Hi Mita Hana no Namae o Boku-tachi wa Mada Shiranai
Genre: Canon Compliant, Drabble Collection, F/M, Gen, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-01
Updated: 2019-06-01
Packaged: 2020-04-06 00:27:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 4,896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19051558
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/petaldancing/pseuds/petaldancing
Summary: Everything they are and everything they aren't. — A collection of Yukiatsu and Tsuruko fic/drabbles written over the years.





	1. Telling Honest Lies

**Author's Note:**

> I figured I should collect my favourite Yukiatsu/Tsuruko stuff together. The full, messy bits and pieces can be found on my old ffnet account, but I have always enjoyed writing this pair and their twisted relationship, ever since the anime first aired. So, here's a neater collection of some of my oldest drabbles and also hey, maybe some new ones! A note that most of them don't have a happy ending. I mean, have you seen these two? That's kinda why I'm like them so much. 
> 
> Most of the drabbles happen during/after the anime so if you haven't finished the anime, go do that first before reading! 
> 
> Of course, the start of this collection has to one of the first Ano Hana fic I wrote. Originally posted on 30 June 2011.

Tsuruko is always at the station fifteen minutes early.

They meet at seven-thirty, take the train for five stops, walk up the street beside the railroad, and reach school with time to spare. It's an unsaid ritual of sorts. Sometimes, they talk about the miniscule things like homework and the latest rumour about that girl and that guy and that third other person who everyone supports. Sometimes, they walk in established silence, and Yukiatsu overhears the students passing by whisper ridiculous things to each other. High school is dreadfully tragic.

* * *

"You expect me to go with you to the karaoke party?"

"We'd be social outcasts otherwise," he shrugs in reply. They aren't exactly chummy with the rest of the class, preferring to keep to themselves aside from the expectations of groupwork and pre-homeroom banter. Yukiatsu likes it this way, the distance and the one-word conversations with his classmates – it makes putting up the act easier for him, keeps the little girl with the long hair and the white dress in his head alive.

"I don't care." Tsuruko's indifferent voice brings him back to the street they are walking down.

"I don't want to go alone," Yukiatsu admits, "happy?"

"The guys will gripe if I skip the class party, and I'm sure the girls will whine like they usually do," the boy persuades, listing down the reasons. The last thing he needs is to go there by himself and be swarmed with enthusiastic faces and mouths moving. Tsuruko's presence is like a spiritual barrier of sorts. One deadpan from her sends them skirting away, and he appreciates her for it. He really does. "Let's just drop off for five minutes and pretend like we're having fun, and then we can get on with our lives."

"You're a pretender," the girl says, like it's the most appropriate response. The ends of her long hair twist together when a passing breeze blows along the roadside.

"Yes," Yukiatsu acknowledges with a nonchalant shake of the head. Life's about pretense, he'd learnt that when he'd been a child, wanting to trade all his rare Nokemon to Menma, but never getting around to. He'd thrown his gameboy away after the grey funeral, claiming he'd been ' _sick of it_ '. "What does that matter?"

"Am I really your friend?" Tsuruko suddenly asks, her voice shrinking for a moment. The air is pulled taunt like a violin string, and he wonders what's this feeling he's getting from her. Yukiatsu has to pause and search for a reply because he's never even thought about this before.

"Tsurumi," he snickers, "you can be such a girl."

"And you're an immature boy."

They end up going to the party, but the moment the class asks Yukiatsu to go up on stage and sing, he grabs Tsuruko, flings a generic excuse to leave, and they bolt out of there.

* * *

He reaches over to her lunchbox and picks up an eggroll with his chopsticks. Tsuruko lets him, watching as he chews, as if waiting for a verdict.

"Hey, this is pretty good," Yukiatsu says after he swallows.

"Thank you," she replies, her expression somewhat pleased. When he looks at her again, he notices how her mouth is tight, and it's almost like she's trying  _not_ to look happy. His interest is piqued.

"You made this? Since when have you known how to cook?"

"I picked it up from my mother recently," she says, staring down at her food to avoid his eyes.

"These really are good." He smiles when he watches the corners of her lips lift a little.

"Alright, you can stop now." She refuses to raise her head, her tone turning sour as she catches on to his sugared words.

"My favourite food is yatsuhashi," he reveals, "just throwing it out there."

"I don't know how to cook that," Tsuruko replies coolly, placing a ball of rice into her mouth and biting down hard.

* * *

Summer is the season he hates to love.

The scent that sticks in the air on the way to school and back, the variety of cold, chilly ice cream and drinks the street-side stores set up on sale, all things Menma would have loved to try if she wasn't sleeping soundly six feet underneath the ground.

And of course, there just has to be swim class under the sweltering sun. The guys are ecstatic, and Yukiatsu thinks that maybe the girls might be even more excited to flaunt their dieting figures. He doesn't particularly care, if at most appreciative for jogging all this time. The boys in class look at him enviously when they change into their trunks, even though he's just skin and bone. The water of the school's pool is clean and calm and why does everything have to come back to Menma again? The trickling river, the abandoned slipper, and the hairclip he's never found.

Tsuruko is sitting on the ground, leaning against the tall metal fence encircling the pool, her knees tucked under her chin. She looks skinny in the school swimsuit, and almost sad as she watches the ripples break across the water surface. Yukiatsu is almost tempted to join her, to just sit down and think quietly, but then he reminds himself that he needs to complete six horrendous laps. As he turns and walks off, he thinks Tsuruko's looking at him from the corner of her eyes.

Later, when they stroll past the train tracks, he makes the mistake of trying to close the space between their shoulders. "What were you thinking about at the pool just now?" he asks.

"Things," she mumbles back.

"You seemed deep in thought," Yukiatsu recalls offhand.

"How long have you known me?" Tsuruko poses the question out of the blue. At times, he has no idea what she thinks about in her head. It's strange because she usually makes pretty good guesses about what's going on in his.

"Never," Yukiatsu informs her, without hesitation and in a pointed tone. He gives as good as he gets.

He watches the shoulders of his friend stiffen and the heel of her right shoe grind into the pavement. A split second crack in her armour, and that's all he needs to prove that this girl isn't all she tries to be.

"Is that so?" she recovers, enough to punctuate this with a short, stale laugh.

"Yes." Yukiatsu says. Maybe he's lying, maybe he's not.

* * *

It's raining.

Tsuruko takes her green umbrella out of her bag. He casually ducks under it right after it's been opened. The girl doesn't object, but she exhales a short sigh to tell him that he should bring his own next time. There's still a ways to go before they reach the train station, and the raindrops fall heavier on the umbrella with every passing pavement. He takes the handle of the umbrella and raises it higher when they maneuver through a group of kids no older than twelve running for shelter. They complain about the dreary weather and cover their heads with their bags.

Yukiatsu remembers when he'd been ten. He'd hated getting wet too, but the others loved playing in the rain, smiling at the sight of grey clouds. The girls had sloshed around with their colourful umbrellas outside the old clubhouse, and Menma had adored jumping into puddles.

"Yukiatsu."

"What?"

"I'm getting wet."

The boy leans the umbrella over to her side, but the rain is pouring and his right sleeve is already soaked. Tsuruko's footsteps are slow, and that's when he remembers that she'd used to walking a second behind him. When he slows his pace, she ends up one step in front of him. She treads through little pools of water, drenching his socks and pant legs.

He can't keep up with her.

* * *

Their class decides to hold a haunted house for the annual school festival.

Boring, conventional, predictable, but Yukiatsu doesn't complain aloud. He tolerates it because he doesn't need to do anything troublesome.

Then, he learns that his classmates intend for him to dress up as a suave vampire and parade the hallways to advertise and draw in customers on the day of the festival. Yukiatsu gives them a blatant 'no'. The last thing he will ever do is to allow someone else to degrade him. He tosses a white sheet over his head and declares that he'll be a ghost. End of story.

Tsuruko is placed in charge of props and design, not because she's artsy or anything, but because it's the hardest job that no one wants. She's constantly stuck in these sorts of positions, not having her way but dealing with it because she's nice. She'd been born like that. She's got niceness all the way down to her toes, though she doesn't show it to everyone. She has the same brand of kindness Menma used to glow with. The only difference is that Menma had worn her kindness like a crown. Tsuruko wears it like a weakness.

Yukiatsu, in comparison, hadn't been born very nice at all. Well, at least he's handsome.

"It's fine," Tsuruko tells him. "It'll end up in my student report anyway. Being smart and getting good grades isn't the only thing the university will consider, Yukiatsu."

He kind of just lets her ramble on in her explanations. The truth is, she takes the bullet of bad luck like a challenge. Yukiatsu admires that little thing about her, just a bit.

He grins when she has to wear a black shirt and pants to blend in with the darkness of the classroom. It suits her perfectly.

* * *

Her hip bones are sharp.

Even through the fabric of her uniform, he can feel them underneath his hands.

"Are you done  _(making a fool of me)_?" Tsuruko asks. He sees the words she's restraining in her eyes.

"They're still here. Deal with it for now." He nods to the gaggle of girls watching patiently on the sidelines of trackfield, waiting for their turn to dance with him around the post-fest bonfire. The last thing he wants to do is entertain them, even briefly, and Tsuruko had been the only form of escape he could manage on such short notice. She doesn't look too happy, but she'll forgive him later. She always does.

"Why don't you just dance with them  _(why must you do this to me)_?" the girl mutters though allows him to lead, one hand holding her cold fingers and the other on her hip.

"Just, because."

"Because?"

"I would rather dance with you than any other person here," he explains with that uncaring tone of his voice he always uses when it comes to the things that don't particularly matter.

Her mouth twitches, with insult or agitation he isn't sure. It's definitely not happiness or flattery, that's all he's certain of. "Every girl wants to be in your place now, you know?" he chuckles as he says this, turning his head to watch the fire burning in the middle of all the dancing couples. The flames flicker under the night, and just when he thinks they are going to roar out, they fall back down over the wood.

"Not every girl."

"Ouch."

She steps on his left foot, but doesn't apologise.

* * *

It's eight am when Tsuruko reaches the train station. The face that she makes when she sees that he's waiting at their usual spot beside the map of the city is priceless.

"I thought I told you I was going to be late," she wheezes, catching her breath. Yukiatsu takes a moment to just bask in the elusive situation of Chiriko Tsurumi making a mistake. This hardly happens, and he should treasure the opportunity while he has the chance.

"Yes, I got your message." He waves the cellphone in his hand to illustrate.

"Why are you still here, then? You'll be late too," Tsuruko asks, her voice lowering to a hiss, like she's desperately trying to understand what is going on. They walk side by side to the platform. Or rather, Yukiatsu walks and Tsuruko scrambles, one hand in her bag, the other gripping onto her train card. It's amazing how she crumbles apart when she can't understand him, maybe it's because she's the only person who knows him so well.

"It's because I was waiting for you," Yukiatsu says.

"I know that," she sighs a heavy, flustered sigh. "Why did you wait?"

Yukiatsu doesn't reply. As they descend down the elevator, the train doors start to close, and they break out into a dash, barely making it through.

They might not be late for school after all.

* * *

Valentine's Day is another horrible square on his calendar. If Menma were alive, she'd be the only reason he'd have to look forward to February 14th. But she isn't – so.

"Those chocolates Tsurumi gave you, are they friendship ones or…?" the girl with the green scrunchie and yellow headband asks. She's the one that sits in the front of class but makes a habit of looking over her shoulder and giggling hysterically when he happens to gaze in her general direction when he wants to copy notes off the whiteboard.

"Does that matter?" is the boy's reply. The hallway is empty, but he's looking at everything except her.

"Yes! I think so!" the girl replies, voice stern and anxious. "I mean, Tsurumi's so boring and quiet and uptight, she doesn't deserve to be your close friend," she reasons it out for herself. Yukiatsu's fingers clench around bag of chocolates she'd given him just a few minutes ago. They'll find the trash can once this is over.

"I think I could be a better friend, you know? Haven't you noticed?" the girl with the irritating voice and the messy hair concludes.

Yukiatsu steps back.

"Don't talk about Tsurumi that way," is all he says. There's neither anger nor hurt in his voice, it comes out sounding like a plain, modest statement.

When he strides down the corridors, he finds Tsuruko standing behind a line of shoe lockers, her nose in a book and her bag waiting in one hand. Yukiatsu stops in his tracks.

"I was waiting for you to go home," Tsuruko clarifies, never looking up from the words.

He makes a dismissive noise, entering into the class across the hall to retrieve his belongings.

"… Thank you."

* * *

"Are you okay?"

"Yes."

"You aren't." Her gaze doesn't leave the ground, but he knows that she knows his eyes are still red.

Yukiatsu rubs his arm across his face once more as they walk away from the parking lot and Menma's father, scraping off the emotion like a scab. He's been off his game recently, it's been harder to keep everything bottled inside and Tsuruko isn't helping one bit. If anything, the way she's been acting recently just makes him feel so unsettled.

She's been moody and adverse to him getting too close, and he's pretty sure she's not on her period because he  _knows_ how she can get when that particular hurricane lands. Tsuruko is different, and he can't resolve the thing that's bugging her if he doesn't know what it is. His only problems are that he's looking at a girl (dead, for seven years by the way) who's looking at another guy. He can't possibly relate to Tsuruko.

He'll ask Anjou about it later when they meet up.

"Do you think I'm weird?" he poses the question thoughtfully.

"Without a doubt  _(but I don't mind)_ ," is Tsuruko's reply, sharp and true.

Yukiatsu chuckles even though his heart still aches for a girl who'll never look at him the way he looks at her. "Yeah," he says, because he knows he can't help it.

* * *

Long after the train has sped off somewhere, he stops kicking the fence. He stops because his foot is sore and his still feels mostly the same. Nothing's different. Jintan is still this big damn hero, and he's relegated to the role of the sore loser. When he turns around, Tsuruko is still standing there, waiting for him. She's holding his bag, which he'd tossed aside at one point.

In her eyes, he doesn't find pity or secondhand embarrassment or any readable emotion. He can't tell what the eyes behind those glasses mean. Maybe it's because the evening is dim and the autumn air is turning cold. The only thing he knows is that Tsuruko's still standing here, waiting for him, like she always has. He remembers the little actions, like her sharing her lunch, the harsh words she says while being a loyal friend, dancing with him when he could have easily picked anyone else. She's called him names before, but she's never called him something he isn't. She's the most honest person he knows.

"I saw you spacing out in class today," the girl clears her throat. She fishes around the file in her bag, pulling out a piece of paper with mathematical symbols scrawled all over. "Here. Just in case you didn't manage to copy the last four questions we went through today."

"Thank you."

He's pretty sure he's not referring to the math notes.

* * *

"Here."

"Why are you giving… this…" Tsuruko's eyes widen.

"I don't need it anymore." He crosses his arms, content with his explanation.

The wig and dress aren't hanging in his closet now. He's folded them up and placed them in the lowest drawer, guarded by Menma's letter.

When she doesn't react, he gets up and moves two train seats down so that there's only one gap between them now. He presses his thumb down and unclips it and tries to slot it against the bangs of her hair, but it's so short and it's hard, he almost pokes an eye out. "Stop. Stop. Stop!" The girl slaps his wrist away. Yukiatsu edges off, remaining still to show that he means no harm. He needs to be careful with Tsuruko, he remembers. Underneath all her hardness, her control over her emotions is no better than Anaru's.

_Girls_.

She looks at him, almost like she's trying to see if he's joking. He frowns, indignant at her suspicion.

She reaches out, pull backs, reaches out, hesitates, before opening her palm. He places the flower hairclip in the center of her hand. Somewhere above, in between the cracks of the clouds, maybe Menma is smiling for Tsuruko, who can't seem to summon her own feelings. Her face is blank, framed by her short hair.

Yukiatsu looks at her feet, crossed at the ankles and fidgeting against each other, very unlike the Tsuruko he's known for seven years. He doesn't quite mean it in a bad way.

"… Alright," the girl in front of him decides, her lips almost curving as she closes her fingers, like a flower around its heart. That one word, and the way her eyes open when she looks straight at him, makes him think that he doesn't need to say anything else right now. Tsuruko knows everything, what he wants to say and what he can't say, just by touching the tip of the hairclip and glancing at him.

Here it is again, this unworded understanding, this weird telepathy thing they have going on, he's not sure when it'd started. He looks at her for a second longer than usual, and it's almost like she's smiling with a frown. The train emerges from the underground tunnel, and he can see the sun setting in between the buildings of the city. It warms his face and casts a certain kind of light on Tsuruko.

Yukiatsu is finally starting to have a clearer picture of her.


	2. But You Still Crumble

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He wants to do something mean. — Yukiatsu.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally posted 1 October 2011.

"Yukiatsu."

His thumb scratches against the glass cup at the sound of  _that_. Only Tsurumi calls him that. Only she can call him that because she never had the courage to stop addressing him that way, never had the ability to trust their friendship to something more than childhood escapades. He lets her because it is the only way he knows how to keep her together.

When Anjou calls him that, it's different. It's not just a clingy nickname. It's a curse, a reminder of things he's been trying to leave behind for six excruciating years. She sits across him in the tiny booth squeezed at the back of the family restaurant, stirring her lemonade with a straw. She doesn't know what she's doing when she uses his name like that. Maybe she thinks she does. Maybe she's trying to outsmart him, push him off balance the way he does it to her. It won't work though. Yukiatsu will always be better.

* * *

Anjou and Menma had coined the name for him, partners in crime only when they didn't need to be.

"Atsumu?" Menma wonders, eyes wide and lips squirming with the pronunciation. The others laugh at the mention of his first name and Yukiatsu is exceedingly embarrassed by how... serious it sounds.

"How are we gonna make that into a cool nickname?" Yadomi asks aloud, raising his hands, expecting the answer to fall from the sky.

"Yuki!" Anjou squeaks, stepping out from their circle, her eyes sturdy and keen behind her spectacles. "I like that," she says, playing with the straps of her overalls.

"Yu-ki-at-su!" Menma chants. A breeze rattles through their secret base, mussing her pretty hair. "I like it! Loads and loads!" she smiles effortlessly. Beautifully.

"Then... Then it's good," Yukiatsu decides, breathless.

* * *

"Yes, Anaru?" he replies, lifting the corners of his lips.

The girl across him stops stirring. She winces and something in her eyes begins to crumble. Yukiatsu wants to do something hateful now, something mean and unexpected and something that will remind him why he's spending time with her, of all people. He wants to tell her he left his wallet at home, he wants to break something. He wants to borrow her fake eyelashes. He could pull them off way better.

Then, he remembers that Menma had been the one who'd given her  _that_ nickname.

He slides his napkin up to her closed fists.


	3. Measured

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He thinks about describing Tsuruko in one word. — Yukiatsu, Tsuruko

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally posted 27 Feb 2012.

When he thinks about describing Tsuruko in one word, he thinks 'measured'. It's not the first word that comes to his mind, but it's the most appropriate one at the moment. She is always controlled when she is with him, frowning in that sort of way that isn't exactly unhappy or angry, never smiling with more than a slight curve of her mouth, her spectacles precisely tilted. Tsuruko sets these unsaid limits on herself and Yukiatsu has never seen the need to press her about it. He's used to her little quirks, as much as she is used to his.

It is when she's talking to Yadom– sorry. It is when she's talking to Jintan, does she get careless. She lets a laugh tumble out in between a conversation. A quiet, modest one (but it is still a laugh and it is still genuine), and Yukiatsu can't help but feel… shortchanged, somehow.

She lets Poppo touch her shoulder and then on the hand when he talks, never pulling away or showing discomfort. Yukiatsu stares at the spectacle from the corner of his eye before folding up his thoughts and storing them at the back of his mind. It doesn't mean anything to him. This is what he tells himself. It's not like he's ever attempted (or been interested) in getting close to Tsuruko, so it would be foolish to get jealous over something as frivolous as this.

_Frivolous_ , huh. Is he channeling Tsuruko now that she's abandoned her stereotype?

But when he watches Tsuruko and Anaru conversing in the only way they know how to – a feeling of mutual hostility buttered with respectful acceptance of one another – he realises that Tsuruko might be discriminating him. The two girls exchange words that begin out stiff and slowly soften up, and they sound agreeable for once. Anaru offers a smile to Tsuruko, and Tsuruko returns it with one of her own. It's small, but it's there. Yukiatsu is immediately bent on figuring out why she lowers her guard for everyone but him.

* * *

"Tsuruko." He stands next to her as they wait for the train on the platform.

"Yukiatsu," she replies.

"Listen," he tries again, turning to face her this time.

"I am," Tsuruko says though she doesn't look up. "I always am."

The boy stops. He looks at her carefully this time. Really looks. She has her nose in a book and a pink flower in her hair. Maybe she hasn't been discriminating him at all.


	4. Red Ribbons

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He keeps buying white dresses for her birthday. —Tsuruko.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally post 27 October 2012 on tumblr.

Tsuruko prefers the years when he doesn’t remember her birthday. When Yukiatsu forgets it’s her birthday, he doesn’t pin expectations on himself, doesn’t feel responsible to do something special (like give her the Reply), the atmosphere is less forced, and Tsuruko can function just as she usually does.

When he remembers it’s her birthday, Yukiatsu shifts, just a little. He acts more familiar, he acts like they are friends and like he knows her and it reminds her of when they were kids and it brings her back to Menma. Yukiatsu simply saying ‘happy birthday’ to her is already too intimate, too much, treading on barren ground they haven’t touched in over seven years and counting. Yukiatsu must feel the same way sometimes, that his buying her a birthday present (it’s another book this odd year) will lead things inevitably back to Menma and her smile and how it had held all of them together.

Tsuruko thinks that some years, Yukiatsu pretends to forget her birthday.

This year she’s twenty-one and Yukiatsu chooses to remember. Tsuruko doesn’t let it affect her, doesn’t doesn’t doesn’t. When she opens the present, ribboned in red, she finds a white dress in the box. There are no frills, the skirt is short and the sleeves are ironed.

Yukiatsu is a petty person. Tsuruko says this knowing that she still likes him, probably will continue liking him no matter how often he does this to her – so what kind of person does this make her?


	5. A Kind of Cruelty

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things you said after you kissed me. — Tsuruko, Yukiatsu.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written 1 June 2019.

Tsuruko is twenty-five and two months younger than Yukiatsu when she decides that it is enough. She can no longer buoy her life to Atsumu Matsuyuki’s, no longer walk with him to university campus at the exact same time every weekday, no longer keep her schedule open for those rare nights when he suggests they grab dinner after a long day of classes in med school. This is not because Yukiatsu is a cruel person—he has always been like that, after all. This is because Tsuruko doesn’t want to become that sort of person.

Normally, you should let difficult things like this go slowly and carefully. Stop answering texts in five minutes, start filling up your days with painting sessions in the studio, then pack less rice into the bento you make for him. Tsuruko does none of this. Instead, she tells him to meet her along the train tracks at sunset, and when he asks why, she says, “Because it’s a longer walk for you than it is for me.”

Tsuruko tells herself that this is what she needs to do, that she won’t stoop as low as Yukiatsu. Won’t harbour lost love for a ghost who will never return it, even though she is already as guilty as him. The hypocrite in her wants to be angry, furious. But, she knows Menma would’ve hated this. And Tsuruko loves her too. So, the anger does not touch her when she sees Yukiatsu appear on the other end of the road, a train rushing past. Instead, it’s only courage, the thing Menma was best at teaching her.

Tsuruko usually knows exactly how Yukiatsu will respond. And she is always two steps ahead because she can chart the way their conversations unravel. But this, this is not something they ever talk about. So she must settle for not knowing.

“I’m not like you,” she starts, staring at the space between her sandals and his boots.

“I know.” Yukiatsu is unperturbed. He stands with his hands tucked into the pockets of his jeans. “But usually, aren’t I the one who gets dramatic and demanding? Are we switching places today?”

“I’m not like you,” Tsuruko repeats to be sure. Then, she raises her gaze to meet his. “So I’m not going to stick around, hoping for the impossible to happen.”

Yukiatsu raises an eyebrow and looks almost hurt.

“I love you,” Tsuruko declares, and does not sound proud of it. “But you can’t use that as a reason to keep me around. I… I can’t use that as a reason anymore either.”

Yukiatsu maintains his straight face, but Tsuruko can tell from the curl of his lips that he is now nervous and afraid. But instead of cowering back, he steps forward. The proximity is new for Tsuruko, who has spent the last decade walking two steps behind him. She does not want to go back to that tiresome cycle, she wants to break it, crush it under her heel. So she touches his cheek and leans in, and when he obliges, she grazes her lips against his.

The kiss is what she expects: vivid pain and faint relief, like waking from a nightmare you don’t remember having.

“Were you always this cruel?” Yukiatsu whispers in her ear.

Tsuruko wants to laugh, or cry, or kiss him again.

But all she does is nod and reply, “I learned from the best.”


End file.
